[flooded]

I need advise I owe $110,000 on a mortgage and the house was worth $125,00 and we have just been flooded for the third time and will cost about $30,000 to fix up. What are my options?

[westnlas]

What caused the flooding ? Weather or a broken pipe ? And what type of homeowners' insurance do you carry ? How much of the repair work can you do yourself ? What does the quote for repairs include ?

[ebaines]

If you aren't having too much difficulty paying the mortgage, then my advice is stay put, make the repairs, and wait out the downturn in the housing market. The housing market like all markets, goes in cycles - it may take a year or perhaps several years, but eventually your house will start to appreciate in vaule again. So unless you are forced to sell because of your interest rate gets reset to a level you can't afford, or you have to relocate for work, stay where you are.

[froggy7]

Well.. keeping in mind that the Midwest is currently flooding, I'm wondering if the question isn't that the house has been flooded three times, sort of along the lines of "I've had three mudslides" out here in California? In which case you may be looking at a situation where you can't get insurance, and can't sell the house either, because it's in an area that is apparently extremely flood-prone.

On the other hand, it could be a broken pipe. We really do need to know more about what is causing the flood to answer the question.

[flooded]

Thanks for the advise and we were flooded by weather. We live by a river and it crested at record levels. My fear is that I will end up borrowing more money to fix it up and have a house that I never can pay off. It has been flooded 3 times in 15 years and will flood again. So I think it will never sell.

[flooded]

We have flood insurance and homeowners insurance. The homeowners insurance will cover only about half of the costs to fix up. Fema says they will give us a 2% loan but that only makes my problem worse

[excon]

Hello flooded:

Are you saying that the flood insurance ISN'T paying? Why not?

excon

[JudyKayTee]

Hello flooded:

Are you saying that the flood insurance ISN'T paying? Why not?

excon

Took the words right out of my mouth! My flood insurance is 100% with the usual ceiling. My homeowners will NOT pay in the event of a flood caused by weather.

Both your flood insurance and homeowners are involved in this claim?

[flooded]

They only cover structural damage and sense are walls are still up (but are severely cracked) they do not cover anyhting else

[excon]

Hello again, flooded:

You'll pardon me if I DON'T trust the insurance company. I might even be so bold as to suggest that some of them lie. IF you bought flood insurance that only covered "structural" damage, then that's on you.

However, I can't imagine flood insurance NOT covering your possessions. I can't image a policy that DOESN'T do that (which means nothing, because I'll bet there is such a policy).

In addition to that, I even suggest that the walls ARE structure.

Did you read your policy? Maybe you should. What you SHOULDN'T DO, is TRUST the insurance company.

excon

[froggy7]

I don't know about flood insurance, but I am looking into earthquake insurance out here in California, and it will cover a lot less than the homeowner's insurance will, and cost me about twice as much. It pays the same amount to rebuild the place, but I am getting 145K for replacing personal possessions with the homeowners (it's a percentage of the cost to rebuild the house), and 5K for personal possessions under the earthquake policy. Homeowner's has a 2K deductible, the earthquake policy is 35K deductible. The only thing that the earthquake policy really does is rebuild the place after a really bad earthquake, which the homeowner's policy won't do.

So, yes, I can see flood insurance saying essentially that they will rebuild the place, but not replace contents. Insurance companies are out to make money, and insuring a spot that has flooded three times in 15 years is not a good way of doing that.